SAN JOSE — Demolition crews have cleared away fire-torched piles of rubble that once were old Victorian homes on a downtown San Jose site that for several years has been a blighted local property.
For seven years, a property at the corner of North Fourth Street and East St. John Street in downtown San Jose has been the site of one of the city’s most high-profile sites of blight.
Fires partially damaged and then fully destroyed two Victorian-era homes. Fires hit the site in the spring and summer of 2024.
The blazes left behind piles of rubble and a situation that prompted some observers to criticize the efforts of San Jose officials and political leaders to deal with blighted properties that haunt numerous locations in the Bay Area’s largest city.
The problem became such a public nuisance the pile of lumber and debris left from earlier blazes caught fire yet again in August 2024, a conflagration that finally spurred city officials to take some concrete action to remedy the blight.
The fire last August forced residents of an adjacent apartment building to flee their homes, a blaze that sent a teenage girl to the hospital. The incident also scorched the neighboring structure.
As of Feb. 15, the empty lot, whose addresses are 100, 120, 146 and 152 North Fourth and 117 North Fifth Street, was cleared of debris, according to a direct observation of the site by this news organization.
It also appears that the two-unit apartment building next door at 160 North Fourth Street has been repainted and the exterior damage repaired.
Bob Staedler, principal executive with Silicon Valley Synergy, a land-use consultancy, embraced word that the property’s rubble and debris was removed.
“It’s really important for the city of San Jose to place a larger emphasis on eliminating blight,” Staedler said.
In September 2024, a judge appointed a receiver to take control of the cleanup of the empty lot. The court order granted the city of San Jose’s request to install a receiver to clean up and secure blighted downtown properties.
It’s also possible that the receiver will take steps to sell the property.
A group headed up by Saratoga business executive Brent Lee has owned the now-vacant lot for more than a decade. When Lee’s group bought the properties the two Victorian homes were still standing on the site.
The homes were on a portion of a site where the Brent Lee-managed group had proposed the development of a 23-story student housing tower that would have produced 298 residential units, city planning files show.
The Lee-led group bought the development site at the corner of North Fourth Street and East St. John Street in 2013, county records show. The price wasn’t disclosed. Lee’s group never broke ground on the tower project.
Sunding Brothers, an entity that owns the small apartment building at 160 North Fourth Street, filed a lawsuit in September 2024 against Lee and the group he heads over the fires, damage and blight on the empty lot.
On Oct. 7, this news organization contacted Lee to obtain his views and perspective regarding the empty lot.
“I can’t say anything beyond the court record,” Lee said at that time. “I have an attorney.”
With crucial sporting events on tap for 2026, including the Super Bowl, multiple matches of the World Cup, and multiple games for the NCAA men’s basketball tournament, San Jose political leaders face pressure to clean up the blight to make the downtown district more attractive.
“It’s great news for downtown San Jose that this has been cleaned up,” Staedler said, referring to the North Fourth Street site. “If people want something to happen in 2026, more of this needs to happen.”